Change.
South Pasadena, CA
2022, Senior, Poetry & Spoken Word
I.
the funny thing about climate change is that
we don’t change.
we cry rivers over dried rivers and
we keep sucking them drier;
we turn on our politicians for not doing enough then
turn down the AC to a comfortable 72 degrees.
as a species we have
matured in complacency;
we swat away the latest IPCC report and
wait apathetically for scientists to
clean up the mess we made—yes,
in twenty years for sure we’ll have
cold fusion and
vacuums that suck carbon out of the sky and
flying cars,
which is what we said twenty years ago.
II.
the funny thing about climate change is that
we always count the change.
when scientists
calculate environmental impact
they use a pure-time discount which means
effects further into the future are downplayed; essentially,
tomorrow doesn’t matter as much as today,
another way of saying
human industry today matters more than
human life tomorrow.
as a species
we sold our soul to gasoline and coal;
we sold our oceans, our forests, our children’s lives
for a pretty penny from the Devil,
two nights each week for beer and
a white picket fence.
III.
the funny thing about climate change is that
the blame always changes hands.
we shuffle the responsibility for this
little predicament we’re in
from consumers to corporations to governments to
everyone blaming everyone else.
it’s easy to think:
who cares if I walk or drive to school;
it doesn’t make a difference—I am just one person—
except it does because
no snowflake ever believes
it is responsible for the avalanche and still
we all come tumbling down together.
IV.
the funny thing about climate change is that
maybe
it’s not too late to change our destiny;
we are Noah’s cargo train of life
barreling towards a concrete barrier at
sixty miles an hour;
we may be the last generation
in this experiment with living but
we may not; maybe
we can muddle through the mudslides and
paradoxes
because
the best time to stop climate change was
three hundred years ago
before factories coughed out
the ashes of defiled ecosystems into
heaven’s hallways and pumped
poisonous profits into
the bowels of the seas but
the second-best time is
now.
Reflection
For “Change.” I chose to focus on the word “change” and all of its meanings. I feel like that’s the really central thing about climate change—change. It’s a change that comes very quickly in geological time, but at the same time so slowly compared to the span of a human life. That makes it easy for us to deny the change and deny our responsibility in that change. “Change.” is a poem about our relationship to change as humans—both our resistance to change and our ability to alter our world and ourselves. It is intended to compel readers to consider how we as a species must change in response to climate change and encourage them to be a part of that change. I wanted to express how frustrated I felt after seeing so many people (myself included) who were distraught about climate change and yet chose not to give up conveniences that contribute to it. I do believe that large corporations and governments need to do more to stop climate change, but at the same time I think a lot of us don’t want to accept our individual responsibility. Partly as a result of writing this poem, I’ve chosen to start walking to school instead of driving. My point was to consider the little changes I can make to take responsibility for my own contribution to climate change, and that’s exactly what I want readers of “Change.” to do, too.